This application seeks partial funding for a conference entitled "Virus Assembly" to be held in Saxton's River, Vermont, June 22-27, 2002, under the sponsorship of the Federation of American Societies of Experimental Biology (FASEB). The specific aims of the conference are: 1. To create a forum for the interaction of scientists that study all aspects of virus assembly, that spans investigator career stage, virus system, and methods of study. The goal is to foster awareness and unconventional collaborations that would not occur as a result of meetings devoted to a single virus group. As discussed in the proposal, past meetings have had a remarkable record of nucleating collaborations of exceptional value and productivity, as well as significantly influencing the direction of individual experiments based on potential virus analogies. 2. To specifically encourage investigators at the graduate student and post doctoral level to pursue careers that blend methods of chemistry, biophysics and cell biology to understand viral pathogenesis, particularly as it relates to particle entry, disassembly, assembly, maturation and exit. We also seek to encourage unconventional aspects of virology as represented at our last meeting by presentations describing plant viruses as bio materials and nano reaction vessels.